36 Nations With No Standing Military

By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Aug 3, 4:29PM EDT · Published Mar 25, 12:00PM EDT

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36 Nations With No Standing Military — © NiseriN / Getty Images

The Russian invasion of Ukraine, a conflict that many experts expected to be over in days, has now stretched on for months. The reason many pundits expected such a short conflict is the relative differences in military size between the warring nations, with Russia’s forces many times larger than that of Ukraine.

The fact that the invasion has dragged on for so long is a reminder that a standing army may not be the only military force in a country. Ukraine’s military numbers 196,000, but many of its citizens have joined in the battle for independence.

The size of military forces generally corresponds to the population. There are a few exceptions, the most notable of which is North Korea. In the United States, less than 2% of the labor force is in the military. In North Korea, the figure comes close to 9%.

Thirty-six nations in the world have no standing militaries at all, according to the CIA World Factbook, as compiled by the World Population Review. Some of these are territories. 24/7 Wall St. reviewed the list, adding population figures from the World Bank.

According to World Population Review, “Countries without militaries have either been demilitarized, never established a military when the country was created, or are former colonies/dependencies of nations with militaries and are still under the protection of those countries.”

Greenland is an example. The largest island in the world is part of the Kingdom of Denmark. Another country without a military is Liechtenstein. Its population is only 39,000. It covers only 62 square miles and sits between Austria and Switzerland.

The Falkland Islands is another territory without a military. It was the site of a war between the United Kingdom and Argentina in 1982. Currently, it is a British Overseas Territory. (Many of the countries on this list are among the world’s least populated countries. And this country has the fewest residents in the world.)

Click here to see these are the nations without a military

36. Niue
> Population: 1,620

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35. Svalbard (unincorporated region of Norway)
> Population: 2,642

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34. Falkland Islands
> Population: 3,480

33. Montserrat
> Population: 4,992

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Nauru College (CC BY-SA 2.0) by Sean Kelleher

32. Nauru
> Population: 10,834

31. Tuvalu
> Population: 11,792

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30. Cook Islands
> Population: 17,565

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29. Palau
> Population: 18,092

28. San Marino
> Population: 33,938

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27. Lichtenstein
> Population: 38,137

26. Monaco
> Population: 39,244

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25. Sint Maarten
> Population: 40,812

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24. Faroe Islands
> Population: 48,865

23. Greenland
> Population: 56,367

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22. Marshall Islands
> Population: 59,194

21. Cayman Islands
> Population: 65,720

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20. Dominica
> Population: 71,991

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19. Andorra
> Population: 77,265

18. Aruba
> Population: 106,766

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17. St. Vincent and the Grenadines
> Population: 110,947

16. Grenada
> Population: 112,519

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Federated States of Micronesia... by Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

Federated States of Micronesia... (CC BY 2.0) by Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

15. Federated States of Micronesia
> Population: 115,021

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14. Kiribati
> Population: 119,446

13. Curacao
> Population: 155,014

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12. St. Lucia
> Population: 183,629

11. Samoa
> Population: 198,410

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10. New Caledonia
> Population: 271,960

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9. French Polynesia
> Population: 280,904

8. Vanuatu
> Population: 307,150

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7. Iceland
> Population: 366,425

6. Macau (China S.A.R.)
> Population: 649,342

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5. Solomon Islands
> Population: 686,878

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4. Mauritius
> Population: 1,265,740

3. Kosovo
> Population: 1,775,378

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2. Panama
> Population: 4,314,768

1. Costa Rica
> Population: 5,094,114

About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.